Merrier Moments

Auckland Star, Volume XLIV, Issue 183, 2 August 1913, Page 15

Merrier Moments

He: "Love letters have a financial value when it comes to damage suits." She: "Why shouldn't they? Aren't they promissory notes?" Mamma: "Tommy, you are a very naughty boy for slapping baby. What did you hit him for?"' Tommy (crying) : "He's drunk all the ink," and he won't cat a piece of blotting paper!" "She has youth, beauty, good temper, cultured tastes, domestic accomplishments—every qualification of the model wife." "Yes, everything except a rich father." "Well, George and Glady6 are to be married next week, and we'll have to give them a present. What will it be, and how much shall we spend?" "I don't know. I'll go as deep as you." "Let's send them something that will make a big show for our money."' "'All right. How about a load of hay?"

"Do you appreciate,"' the old man asked of the youth, who sought the hand of his daughter, "that marriage is attended with greater difficulties and discouragements than it ever was before?" The youth would have spoken, had not the patriarch waved him to silence. "Do you realise (he threw his whitened locks back from his brow) that the latc-at-the-oflicc excuse and the sitting-upvwith-a. >lek-frieiul idea have have been worn so thin that even a blir.d woman can see through them, and that as yet nothing has appeared to take their place?" THE NEW LODGER. Landlady: "1 hope the noise of the trams won't wake you." Mr O'Flannigan (who is n sound sleeper): " No. bedad! If they dont wake mc before 1 go to slape, begorra, they won't afterwards.'' ONLY DARED TO THINK. " Father." said a little boy, " had Solomon seven hundred wives?' " I believe so. mv son." said the father. " Well, father, was he the man who said. 'Give mc liberty or give mc dealril i" CONTRADICTORY. "Here's a man who has a queer job," said the Cheerful Idiot, as he looked up /rom bis paper. "What docs he do?" "lie is bookkeeper for a bookseller, replied the Cheerful Idiot. WHY SHE THOUGHT SO. Meg (five years old) was overjoyed over the recent addition to the family, and rushed out of the house to tell the news to a passing nei,gh*bour. "Oh. you don't know what we've got in our house to-day!" "What is it?" "It's a new baby brother!" "You don't say" so! Is he going to stay?" ". think so." very thoughtfully. "He s got hie things off!" MUST HAVE TIME. The reader was refusing a play. "My dear man.'' he said to the author, "it is plain you don't understand modern, up-to-date construction. Why. in th-* play. Mr ITamfat. as the star, wouldn't be off the stage live minutes from the first act to the last." "But." faltered the young playwright, "T thought the stars all liked that." "No. no." said the reader; "not your up-to-date stars, not your twentiethcentury actor-managers. No. no. young man. You must al-n-ays leave, your modern actor-managor at least fifteen minutes in the second act, to go round to' •the box-office and watch the money being counted." FORESIGHT. The lady who had charge of a certain village post office was strongly suspected of tampering with parcels entrusted to her care. One day a rosy-cheeked youngster, dressed in bis best clothes, entered the oflice and carefully laid a huge slice of iced cake on the counter. "With my sister the bride's co-mpli-menifs. and will you please eat as much as you can?" be said. Tbe postmistress smiled delightfully. "How very kind of the bride to remember mc," sin? cried. "Did she know of my weakness for wedding cake?" "She did." answered the youngster coldly, "and she thought she's send you a bit of it this afternoon, just to take the edge off your appetite before she posted any boxes to her friends."

The Candidate (passionately): "From the day 1 was 12 I earned my own living! I owe no man a penny. Gentlemen. I made myself!" A voice: ''Well, you made a mistake!"

"Oh, Mrs. Giveaway," exclaimed, the bride, "I want to thank you so much for your splendid gift." "A mere trifle, my dear," replied llrs. Giveaway, mat* ried one year. "A mere trifle." * "Well, I didn't think so when I gave it t<J you.' .

LADIES. READ THIS. "What's the trouble at your house?" "Hunger strike for a new bonnet." "Your wife refuses to eat?" "No; she refuses to cook/ A RASTUS STOR\". Rastus was ill, and the physician was visiting him. "What yo' fink is de mattah wlf mc, doctah''" he asked. "Oh, nothing much,'' said the doctor. "Only a slight case of chicken-pox." Rastus grew nervous. "I 'clare, doctah," he said, earnestly, "I hain't been nowhar whar I could ketch dat!" THE COUNTRY VISIT. Little Betsy was sent to the countnr for a fortnight's holiday, and one morning, while watching her uncle, the farmer, milking the cow, she asked him: •'When you've finished milking the cow, how do you turn it off?" INSTRUCTING THE JUDGE. The proverbial advice, "Cobbler, stfcl. :o your last," had an apposite exemplifi■ation in the following anecdote:— A coloured man was brought before a police judge, charged with stealing •hickens. He pleaded guilty, and reeived sentence, when the judge asked low it was be managed to lift those hi. kens right under the window of their iwner's house when there was a dog in v he yard? "Hit wouldn't be of no use. Judge," •aid the culprit, "to try to 'splain dis thing to you all. Ef you was to try it. like as not you would git yer hide full o* shot, an' git no chickens." neither. Ef you wan*t to engage in any rascality, •Judge, yo' beftah stick to de Bench, whar yo' am familiar!" THE JUDGING OF .JOSS. An affectionate bride once bit upon the original idea of expressing her husband's perfections in terms of chocolate cake: when he was good he was "choco-late-cake three layers deep": w-hen ha was very good he was "four layers I deep." and so on up the scale. 1 One day, however; the system broke down. The bride's mother dropped in, and noticed that her daughter looked vexed at something. "How is John to-day?" the mother asked, pretending not to notice the bride's vexation. '-Chocolate-cake four layers deep?" ""No." "Three layers deep?" "No." "Two?" "No." "Then what is he." "Dog-biscuit." '

WHAT COULD SHE SAY? Lawyers have a way of making things so clear that no one but a- lawyer- can understand them. A distinguished member of the profession was recently probing a witness. ....... "My good woman," he said, in an imperfectly patient voice, "you must ..he specific; you must give an answer in the fewest possible words of whrch you are capable, to the plain and simple question whether you were crossing the street with tbe baby on your arm and the omnibus was coming down on the right side and the cab on the left and tbe brougham was trying to pass tbe omnibus, **.*rid, you saw the plaintiff, between the brougham and the cab, or whether and when you saw him at all. and whether near or not near the brougham, cab, or omnibus, or either, or any two, and which of them respectively—or how was it?" "Yes, sir!" ventured the -witness, in utter confusion.